Removing Thunderbird from fedora-29 removes 68 packages (of which 11 qubes packages)

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tom...@gmail.com

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Apr 19, 2019, 6:28:15 PM4/19/19
to qubes-users
Hi guys,

I installed Q4.0.1 on USB HDD to see changes from 3.2.
As I've decided to use fedora-29 for system-related VMs, I wanted to remove large apps like Firefox and Thunderbird from it.
But running 'dnf remove thunderbird' on f29 template resulted in removal of 67 other packages, which seems important.

Any idea what's wrong?
I used latest Qubes ISO and updated dom0 and fedora-29 template before this removal.

Note: I've stripped all but 1st column of output for readability
{code}
Removing:
thunderbird
Removing dependent packages:
qubes-vm-recommended
Removing unused dependencies:
ethtool
fakeroot
fakeroot-libs
js-jquery
libnftnl
libtomcrypt
libtommath
mozilla-filesystem
nautilus-python
net-tools
nftables
openpgm
pciutils
pciutils-libs
pulseaudio-qubes
python-systemd-doc
python2-babel
python2-backports
python2-backports-ssl_match_hostname
python2-backports_abc
python2-cairo
python2-chardet
python2-crypto
python2-futures
python2-idna
python2-ipaddress
python2-jinja2
python2-markupsafe
python2-msgpack
python2-nose
python2-numpy
python2-olefile
python2-pillow
python2-psutil
python2-pycurl
python2-pysocks
python2-pytz
python2-pyyaml
python2-qubesimgconverter
python2-requests
python2-singledispatch
python2-six
python2-systemd
python2-tornado
python2-urllib3
python2-xpyb
python2-zmq
qubes-core-agent-dom0-updates
qubes-core-agent-nautilus
qubes-core-agent-network-manager
qubes-core-agent-networking
qubes-core-agent-passwordless-root
qubes-gpg-split
qubes-img-converter
qubes-input-proxy-sender
qubes-mgmt-salt-vm-connector
qubes-pdf-converter
qubes-usb-proxy
salt
salt-ssh
socat
thunderbird-qubes
tinyproxy
usbutils
web-assets-filesystem
zeromq

Transaction Summary
================================================================================
Remove 68 Packages
{code}

regards,
tom

unman

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Apr 19, 2019, 7:53:12 PM4/19/19
to qubes-users
Nothing wrong.
There's a meta package called qubes-vm-recommended which pulls in all sort of
qubes features, and useful software.
When you set to remove thunderbird, it removes qubes-thunderbird, which
then removes qubes-vm-recommended, and that removes all dependencies of
*that* package : what you are seeing is the consequence of that.

I'm not that familiar with Fedora, but you need to set the qubes
packages individually to retain them: you can do this with 'dnf mark
install'.
Or, you can set clean_requirements_on_remove to false in
/etc/dnf/dnf.conf. That will break the dependeny requirements.

An alternative approach would be to start with the minimal template and
install the packages you want individually rather than using the meta
package.

unman

Foppe de Haan

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Apr 20, 2019, 12:36:54 AM4/20/19
to qubes-users
On Friday, April 19, 2019 at 10:28:15 PM UTC, tom...@gmail.com wrote:
> Hi guys,
>
> I installed Q4.0.1 on USB HDD to see changes from 3.2.
> As I've decided to use fedora-29 for system-related VMs, I wanted to remove large apps like Firefox and Thunderbird from it.
> But running 'dnf remove thunderbird' on f29 template resulted in removal of 67 other packages, which seems important.
>
> Any idea what's wrong?
> I used latest Qubes ISO and updated dom0 and fedora-29 template before this removal.
> ================================================================================
> Remove 68 Packages
> {code}
>
> regards,
> tom

try dnf remove thunderbird --noautoremove

tom...@gmail.com

unread,
Apr 20, 2019, 6:45:44 PM4/20/19
to qubes-users
Great, thank you both!

1. 'dnf mark install qubes-vm-recommended'
2. 'dnf remove thunderbird-qubes' (on which above metapackage depends). This way it removes removes also the recommended meta-package, but leaves its other dependencies

Let's mark this as completed


Jon deps

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Apr 20, 2019, 7:10:38 PM4/20/19
to qubes...@googlegroups.com
On 4/20/19 4:36 AM, Foppe de Haan wrote:
something similar happened when I removed Firefox from Debian-9 ,
thinking I could use it for sys-net and have less updates .... I

hope I didn't remove anything that weakened security or such ?


but for the record how would one Not just removed Tbird/FF without
removing it's Qubes dependencies if any ?

unman

unread,
Apr 20, 2019, 8:22:21 PM4/20/19
to qubes...@googlegroups.com
I dont think that firefox should have that effect.

In Debian, you either mark the packages as manually installed, or
something like:
dpkg -r --force-depends thunderbird

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